Plantagenet wrote:I've always maintained that just about everyone is releasing too much CO2 into the atmosphere, and the resultant global warming will eventually cause us some very big problems, and just possibly produce another mass extinction event (i.e. "kill the planet").
Here's more evidence of that idea....studies now show that huge amounts of CO2 are released into the atmosphere by the consumption of digital content on the internet.
internet-video-porn-carbon-dioxide-emissions-research
the numbers are stunning.....when you add up all the CO2 released by on-line internet users, it comes to 300 million tonnes of CO2 emissions per year (resulting from energy consumption). Most of this is for people watching videos, with porn videos alone ‘emitting’ just under 100 million tonnes per year – nearly as much as Belgium and Kuwait.
Plantagenet wrote:I've always maintained that just about everyone is releasing too much CO2 into the atmosphere
Outcast_Searcher wrote:I know, we could all live like the Amish, and shun most technology and use a hell of a lot less energy. But unless all the power suddenly goes away, or God itself shows up and decrees it via force -- I don't see that happening in any shape or form.
Outcast_Searcher wrote:IMO, it's not that the internet is "so bad", it's that it is so very big and so all-consuming of time of so many billions of people -- so in total, it consumes a lot of energy. Given how huge it is globally, frankly I'm stunned it's NOT using far more energy than just the two countries mentioned.
Exactly. Of course online services produce co2 emissions, just like offline services produce co2 emissions. Doesn't mean we would be better off without online services. The offline services may very well produce more co2 emissions than the online services. Not to mention that there is an increase in value in the online service relative to the offline service. Do you really want to go back to hopping in your car, driving to the video rental store, picking out your movies, driving back home, watching the movies, driving back to the store to return the videos, then driving back home?Outcast_Searcher wrote:OK. That's a lot of CO2 in absolute terms.
However, given what folks can/could be doing if they were not spending time online, it might well be even worse.
How does e-commerce stack up on emissions?The full lifecycle emissions from a products’ consumption is in many cases dominated by the manufacturing processes and the product’s use. However, the emissions associated with the distribution of goods from manufacturer to consumer (the retailing process) also matter.
On the direct greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions produced by the retailer, the evidence is clear and in favour of e-commerce. Online stores require data centres (which are increasingly powered by dedicated renewable energy installations) and a relatively small number of large distribution centres. By comparison, the environmental footprint created by an extensive retail store network - that is temperature controlled and well lit - is much larger.
There are a number of academic studies that are beginning to get more precise in the estimation of the current GHG emissions. A study by Dimitri Weideli at MIT Centre for Transportation and Logistics, assessed the carbon footprint of the buying process of a toy in an urban area. The research studied the buying process separated into ‘traditional shoppers’ and ‘cybernaughts’, looking at various different types of shopping process. In the chart below, which summarises the findings, the extent of the impact of customer transportation emissions for the traditional shopper is clear, as is the packing and parcel delivery related emissions associated with ecommerce.
Environmental Analysis of US Online ShoppingABSTRACT: Since the advent of the Internet in the 1990s, there has been a significant increase in online shopping in the United States. As online shopping keeps growing, so does the online retail industry. Multiple players are investing either through pure online retailing or by click and mortar retailing, which also has a physical presence and a face-to face experience with their customers. This thesis attempts to estimate and compare the carbon footprint of the shopping process through ten consumer buying behaviors representing different combinations of the search, purchase and return phases of the shopping process for three representative products (electronics, clothing and toys). Using Monte Carlo Simulation, multiple scenarios of supply chain configurations, consumer transportation choices, urban density, packaging and item bundling are evaluated. Results show that online shopping is the most environmentally friendly option in a wide range of scenarios.
De-Carbonization Series: Retail vs E-Commerce - Life Cycle AnalysisLife cycle analysis is a “systematic approach of looking at a product's complete life cycle, from raw materials to final disposal of the product. It offers a 'cradle to grave' look at a product or process, considering environmental aspects and potential impacts.” (Life Cycle Analysis: A Step by Step Approach, 2009, Aida Sefic Williams). When comparing emissions of e-commerce versus traditional retail, getting a product to the consumer is just one part of the puzzle. There’s also what happens before delivery, especially inventory logistics and packaging. I’m going to cut to the chase: e-commerce beats traditional retail hands-down. Here are a couple quotes.
“Our results confirm prior findings that e-commerce delivery uses less primary energy and produces less CO2 emissions than traditional retailing. Considering retail and e-commerce logistics differences, the three largest contributors were customer transport, packaging, and last mile delivery. Customer transport encompassed approximately 65% of the traditional retail primary energy expenditures and CO2 equivalent emissions on average. For e-commerce, packaging and last mile delivery were responsible for approximately 22% and 32% of the e-commerce energy usage, respectively. Overall, e-commerce had about 30% lower energy consumption and CO2 emissions compared to traditional retail using calculated mean values.”
“…The bottom line? Unless you’re walking or biking to the bookstore, buying a book online results in lower carbon emissions than purchasing it from a traditional bookstore. Light-duty delivery vehicles operated by companies like UPS and FedEx travel well-designed routes that serve multiple consumers in a minimum of trips, achieving fuel economy higher than that of a typical individual consumer driving alone to make the same purchase.”
America's addiction to absurdly fast shipping has a hidden cost
Search. Compare options. Click buy. Look out for a package on your doorstep the next day, or even that same day, without ever having to get in your car. The mail truck comes by and drops off your order with a bunch of others, probably on a route she would've been driving anyway, no extra trip needed. Totally green, right?
Well, not exactly.
In May, Amazon announced that tens of millions of items on its platform would be available not only for free two-day shipping, but same-day delivery, with a Prime subscription. Other retailers have no choice but to compete: Fast lead times at no extra charge can make the difference between winning the sale or losing it.
Following Amazon's rollout, Walmart unveiled free one-day shipping without a membership fee, and Target already had a free one-day program for its loyalty cardholders. According to the research firm Rakuten Intelligence, over the past two years the time from purchase to delivery has declined from 5.2 days to 4.3 days. Amazon is faster still, at 3.2 days on average.
The problem is, there is a cost to the environment — and retailers are doing a careful dance to try to mitigate it without turning customers away.
"The time in transit has a direct relationship to the environmental impact," says Patrick Browne, director of global sustainability at UPS. "I don't think the average consumer understands the environmental impact of having something tomorrow vs. two days from now. The more time you give me, the more efficient I can be." .........
https://www.cnn.com/2019/07/15/business ... index.html
GHung wrote:I buy some things online rather than driving to pick them up (not that there's much nearby in my area anyway), and I don't do next-day shipping because of cost, and it generally means a special trip up here by Fedex or UPS. I almost always use USPS even if it means a few more days because they come every day anyway. The whole same/next day shipping thing seems wasteful and over-the-top to me.
Outcast_Searcher wrote:......
Of course, it's well known that more rural living has a higher CO2 footprint per capita. It's just a fact of life, given the high CO2 impact of transportation -- especially ICE driven transportation.
.........
kublikhan wrote:
The point about the last mile of delivery(ie, you driving to the store) contributing a large portion of the co2 emissions was stressed over and over again in the studies. And the question is not what you do personally but what most people do. Sure some people might do the majority of their shopping by walking or biking to the store. However the average household drives their cars nearly 5,000 miles per year for shopping. So the facts do not support the picture you are trying to paint of retail shopping having lower emissions.Plantagenet wrote:Look closely at these two graphs. The graph on the left for retail assumes that people are emitting HUGE amounts of CO2 when they got shopping. Look at that huge blob of CO2 supposedly emitted by "customer travel."
Sorry, but that isn't necessarily so. When I lived in Europe I simply went downstairs and walked a block to the neighborhood market for my food. I had zero CO2 emissions when I went shopping, and so did just about everybody else in that city. If I wanted to shop in another part of town I took mass transit to get there. I had minimal CO2 emissions. The same thing holds in NYC, Boston, and most urban settings.
You don't have huge CO2 emissions when you can walk or bike or take mass transit to the grocery store, as is the norm for millions of people in cities today.
I suspect the study you are referring too was done to promote online shopping and is presenting a biased view of how much carbon is released through retail shopping. Clearly that graph doesn't necessarily reflect modern urban reality, i.e. people in modern urban settings rely on mass transit or even walk to stores from their condos and apartments produce minimal to zero CO2 emissions the they go shopping.
CHEERS!
SUMMARY OF TRAVEL TRENDSHOUSEHOLD TRAVEL
Annual personal miles traveled per household for shopping: 4,620 miles
average personal trip length when shopping: 6.5 miles
kublikhan wrote: And the question is not what you do personally but what most people do.
Plantagenet wrote:When I lived in Europe
asg70 wrote:Plantagenet wrote:When I lived in Europe
Why aren't you still there?
tire wrote:I would guess he likes Alaska better. What's your guess?
asg70 wrote:tire wrote:I would guess he likes Alaska better. What's your guess?
He's never disclosed his career but I would guess it's somehow not far removed from the oil industry up there, which would be why he's such a fan of psychological projection. Sort of like a closeted harp-seal clubber who belongs to Greenpeace.
tire wrote:It looks to me to be related to climate change research.
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